# Therapeutically Exploiting a Newly Isolated Neural-Like Stem Cell Against GSB

> **NIH NIH R01** · COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY HEALTH SCIENCES · 2020 · $315,242

## Abstract

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant):  GBMs are rapidly fatal and kill close to 14,000 patients annually in the US alone. The goal of this proposal is to therapeutically exploit a newly isolated pure population of neural-like stem cells (NLSCs) that we recently derived from pericytes and can thus potentially be a source of autologous transplantation. The objectives of our application are to use an innovative remote-controllable stem cell-based platform to allow us to non-invasively activate NLSC production of a novel highly toxic targeted bacterial cytotoxin at the time and place of our choosing. The central hypothesis to be tested is that we can therapeutically exploit our NLSCs using image-guided HIFU in an innovative way to mildly heat tumor tissue at the depth of our choosing and induce a novel therapeutic production controlled by the heat shock protein 70 promoter (pHSP70). To test this hypothesis, 2 specific aims will be performed: (Specific Aim 1) To demonstrate tumor tropism and safety of peripherally isolated NLSCs. (Specific Aim 2) To demonstrate the feasibility of using image-guided HIFU remote activation to induce a TQM13-CTX, a novel targeted anti-GBM therapeutic that targets the tumor-restricted IL13R�  Delivery of therapeutic agents specifically to tumor cells but not to the surrounding normal brain tissue using novel stem cell-based therapies offers hope against GBM, an invariably fatal disease. Thus, this proposal has strong translational relevance.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 9993324
- **Project number:** 5R01CA179072-06
- **Recipient organization:** COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY HEALTH SCIENCES
- **Principal Investigator:** Akiva Mintz
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $315,242
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2017-09-01 → 2022-08-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/9993324

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 9993324, Therapeutically Exploiting a Newly Isolated Neural-Like Stem Cell Against GSB (5R01CA179072-06). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-25 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/9993324. Licensed CC0.

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